Motorcycles have now become a basic mode of transportation. The proliferation of motorcycles has been due in no small part to the fact that the fuel economy is exceptionally high. Additionally, technological advances in motorcycles have made them more reliable and more powerful, thereby permitting motorcycles to be used in highway situations, as well as in urban areas.
While it may be argued that motorcycles are not inherently dangerous, the fact that the rider is in such an exposed position at the time of any crash or collision makes the operator extremely vulnerable to injury. Recently, many states have passed mandatory helmet laws, and the use of safety or crash helmets has greatly reduced the number of fatalities in motorcycle crashes. Nevertheless, bodily injuries to motorcyclists remain an issue of serious concern.
There have been various suggestions advanced for protecting the cyclist in a crash. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,930,667 discloses an inflatable garment for crash protection, wherein a suit worn by the motorcyclist is inflated at the instant of a collision. A similar inflatable suit is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,059,852. While these inflatable garments provide a modicum of protection to the cyclist, they do not prevent the broken bones and fractured limbs which often occur in a motorcycle collision. It should be noted that cyclists are frequently injured by being thrown from the cycle, and a collision with another vehicle or a fixed object is not necessarily the only situation in which injury may occur.